


new traditions

by rainingover



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Christmas Decorations, Christmas Tree, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, Holidays, M/M, Married Couple
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:07:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28296516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rainingover/pseuds/rainingover
Summary: Ten and Kun have never really seen eye to eye when it comes to the importance of holiday themed decorations.
Relationships: Chittaphon Leechaiyapornkul | Ten/Qian Kun
Comments: 25
Kudos: 137





	new traditions

**Author's Note:**

> happy holidays / happy thursday everyone <3

Ten and Kun have never really seen eye to eye when it comes to the importance of holiday themed decorations.

The truth is that they find it difficult to agree on a lot of things, at least at first before they talk things through. The truth is that Ten has no idea what domestic bliss means, but if it doesn’t mean getting to hear Kun’s side of every argument, he doesn’t want it. He wants to  _ feel _ something new every day, and with Kun, he does.

That’s love, he thinks. 

True love is disagreements that end in both sides learning a new perspective, and it’s laughing over things they hear on the radio in the car after having to play rock, paper, scissors to agree on a station. It’s Ten rolling his eyes at the sheer amount of wholesale candy canes that Kun buys in December and it’s Kun hiding a scarf in the back seat of the car for Ten to wear when he inevitably grumbles about the cold weather, even though he was adamant he didn’t need to bring a scarf out with him. 

Like today—today, they're going to pick out a tree to decorate. The tree-farm is out in the country, about forty minutes drive outside the city, and it's apparently the best place to get a real Christmas tree for miles around. 

Kun had spent weeks researching the best place in the area to buy the perfect tree, after last year’s tree had lost its pines quickly despite Kun treating it like a king. He’d roped their friend Sicheng into helping with the task, and they’d set up a Research Station in the kitchen, which was basically just Kun searching farms on his laptop and Sicheng chipping in with comments he was reading on Facebook from random people who may or may not have made up their reviews.

Ten had sat at the breakfast bar sketching for one of his projects and eating slices of their pizza, and they hadn’t asked for his opinion even once. Or, they had, maybe— Kun pinging the link to the farm through to Ten’s iPad once they’d decided on a place— but Ten hadn’t actually clicked the link, had just said “Yeah, looks good,” because he knew Kun would make the best choice.

Really, it’s not important what Ten thinks about the tree farm, or any of the festivities really. What’s important is that Kun gets to have a special tree, one he’s really excited about. He deserves it, and that’s why Ten is here, up early and on the road on a Sunday to pick ‘the best’ out of what Ten considers to be hundreds of identical spiky green trees.

When they park up at the farm, Ten opens the passenger door, he immediately grimaces. 

Kun picks up on this minor change in his expression so quickly that Ten doesn’t have the chance to fix his smile before Kun asks, "Do you want a scarf?"

"No." Ten steps out of the car and pulls up the zipper on his jacket as if that's going to help his cold neck. “It was at least five degrees warmer when we left the house," he mumbles.

“It was exactly the same temperature," Kun says. He's probably not wrong, but Ten is sticking to his guns on this. "Which is why I suggested you put on gloves and a scarf."

“No, it definitely feels different out here,” he says. "Maybe the temperature reading in your car isn't working."

Kun just grabs the scarf from the back-seat and wraps it around Ten’s neck, tucking it neatly inside his jacket and smiling at him as he does it. He makes an effort not to let his cold fingers touch any of Ten's skin, which is adorable, and Ten might smile back at his husband if his face wasn't so damn freezing. “Looks cute,” Kun says. Ten just pouts.

The first Christmas they'd spent together, Ten had been living with his old housemates in a tiny apartment downtown. They'd not bothered with decorations, all in favour of spending their December paychecks on extra alcohol. Johnny had picked up two kegs of German beer that technically none of them even liked, and then Yuta had argued that vodka should be their Christmas drink of choice, and had lined their shelves with different brands, ranging from expensive stuff to the really low value paint-stripper that their local store stocked.

When Kun had come round to Ten’s place after dinner one evening, he'd looked around at the lack of lights and sparkle, and he'd said, "Interesting design choice. Is it meant to be a statement or are you just not into Christmas festivities?" He’d not been judging, but Ten wonders now if maybe he’d been more disappointed that night than he’s ever let on to him since.

"We're grad students," Ten had said, because, really, that usually answered most questions about why they were sitting in the dark and drinking cheap booze. He added, "We're poor," for some extra context.

They’d taste-tested Yuta’s vodka selection and then Ten had drawn some mistletoe on a scrap of paper which might have been a utility bill, and they’d kissed underneath it before the end of the night. It hadn’t been their first kiss, but it had been a special one, and Ten still gets giddy when he thinks about it sometimes, even now they’re married.

Kun had bought him a string of multi-coloured fairy lights that year, and he'd offered them wrapped perfectly and tied up with a bow on Christmas eve, “just in case you feel like putting something up tomorrow.” 

Ten still has them now, five years later, in a box that has moved with him from that shared apartment, to the one-bed he moved into for only 6 months, and then to the apartment he and Kun first shared before they moved into their house together. 

They hold a sentimental value that Ten doesn’t have for a lot of objects, so he’s kept them but never dared using them. Using them would mean the risk of one of the bulbs breaking, or the wires fraying, and although it has always felt silly, Ten has never felt like taking them out of the box is worth the risk of breaking the first gift his husband had ever bought him. 

Once Ten is warmly wrapped up in his scarf and the spare pair of gloves that Kun also brought with him, they head towards the entrance of the tree-farm. There, a pair of assistants dressed in bright green elf costumes, complete with bell-adorned hats and floppy shoes, wave to them enthusiastically, beckoning them over. 

"I'm Yangyang!" One of the assistants smiles widely. Ten can't tell if this is genuine enthusiasm or if he's actually about to crack under the pressure of a holiday job. "This is my family's farm! We have been growing traditional, Nordmann Fir Christmas trees for over seventy years.”

“And I’m Dejun, who can help you with decorations and gift wrap in the gift store afterwards! Please stop by after you’ve got your perfect tree,” he chants. It’s so well rehearsed it’s kind of funny, but Ten gets it. Making money over winter is a  _ seriously _ competitive business.

“Do you know what size of tree you're looking for today?" Yangyang asks them. 

"Big one," Ten says, just as Kun says, "Something between 210 and 240cm."

Yangyang is trying not to laugh when Dejun says, “Big is good.” He pauses “I mean, there’s more room to decorate!”

Kun smiles. “We have a lot of decorations at home, but if we do need anything more we will keep you in mind, thank you.” 

Ten just repeats, “Big is good,” in Kun’s ear, and ignores the jab to the ribs his husband gives him.

“Follow me!" Yangyang then calls, waving for Kun and Ten to follow him. He leads them towards a row of Christmas trees, the bells on his hat and sleeves jingling as he walks. The trees all look the same to Ten, but Kun spends fifteen minutes looking them over, and ends up in a serious debate with both Yangyang and his coworker over the pros and cons of different branching patterns when decorating with baubles. 

The tree that Yangyang ends up talking them into buying is 250cm high, which is almost taller than their ceiling in the living room, and hardly fits on the roof of their car. It takes Kun, Ten, Yangyang, Dejun  _ and _ another of their Elf-costumed friends to actually get the tree onto the roof-rack (one that Ten persuaded Kun to buy back when he was convinced they were going to spend a summer cycling around Europe, something that is yet to happen) and fastened securely enough to brave driving back home with it on top of the car.

"Thank you for your help!” Kun calls to them, as they get into the car ready for the drive back to the city. 

"You're welcome, enjoy your holidays!" Yangyang is  _ still _ smiling. Ten wonders if he actually hates his job and the smile is him trying to fake it until he makes it, or whether he's really that cheerful all of the time. Either way, he's clearly a great salesperson because he just persuaded them to drop a lot more money than they intended to on a tree that they have to now get into their house and decorate. 

“I feel like he just stole from us. But, like, we asked him to do it.” Kun shakes his head, when they get onto the highway. “And we enjoyed being robbed.”

“Don’t worry about the money,” Ten says. He doesn’t want Kun to feel any guilt over this purchase, since it means so much to him. “It was the best tree in that farm. If anything,” he says, “It was a bargain deal.”

Kun laughs loudly enough for it to drown out the radio. “I know you’re lying.” He turns and grins. “But I’m grateful for it.”

Ten waits until Kun looks back at the road before he grins in pure glee. 

As they pull up outside of their home, the enormity of the tree they have just bought really hits home. Ten stands in front of the car, feeling helpless while Kun stands next to him and smacks his lips in thought. “We could… If we make some sort of pulley, maybe....”

“Yeah.” Ten isn’t convinced, though he loves his husband’s enthusiasm, as wavering as it seems to be right now.

“Or we could…” Kun walks around to the other side of the car and considers the tree from another angle, as though it might give him some more inspiration. He looks handsome like this - hands on hips, trying to resolve a problem. At least it isn’t a problem that Ten has caused, for once. “Maybe if we get the ladder we could strap it on to keep it upright and sort of drag it through the house.”

“I'm calling Yukei,” Ten decides. “I'm sure he’ll come over and help get it inside if we bribe him with BBQ.” 

Kun says, “We’ll manage,” but he is looking even less convinced than before, so Ten gets out his phone.

He calls Yukhei, who answers the phone breathlessly. “Uh, hi! Ten!” He coughs. “How’re you?”

“Have I uninterrupted something?” Ten asks. He’s _definitely_ interrupted something. 

“Uhhh.” Yukhei hesitates, as if he’s deciding whether to share. “Yeah, I was having sex.”

Ten squawks, “And you answered the phone to me?!”

“We were done!” Comes a shout from the background. Ten doesn’t recognise the voice. 

“New boyfriend,” Yukhei explains. “Guanheng. You’re on loudspeaker with us. And we were indeed done.  _ Just _ .”

“Wonderful news.” Ten shakes his head in disbelief. This is so weird, but not as much of a surprise as it would be if it were basically any other one of their friends. Yukhei is kind and he’s clever and empathetic, but he’s also an oversharer. It’s cool. “Hi Guanheng.”

There’s the sound of rustling, like maybe they’re wrestling, or doing something else. “Yeah, we’re just gonna stay in bed for the whole entire holidays,” Yukhei says finally. 

Ten feels like he’s part of something far too intimate right now. “Sounds disgusting, but good for you.” Ten laughs. “Anyway I was just calling to see if you wanted to grab dinner with me and Kun, but since you’re busy, I’ll leave you to it.”

“Aww, thanks Tennie!” Lucas ends the call with a cheerful goodbye, which his boyfriend echoes. They sound like a good match. 

Kun asks, “Is he coming?” while comparing the width of the tree with the width of the front door using hand movements.

_ Already did, _ Ten thinks, but he just shakes his head. “He’s busy,” he says. 

Just as Ten is contemplating suggesting they drive back and swap the tree for something a little smaller, the door of the house next door opens and Doyoung steps out, Taeyong at his shoulder. “Can we help?” Doyoung calls. The smell of some kind of freshly baked cake or cookies wafts out from their home and into the street.

“Have you ever moved an eight foot tree into a house through a small front-door?” Ten calls over to him. 

“Yeah.” Doyoung smiles. “We got ours on Tuesday.” 

Ten mumbles, “Of course you did.” Doyoung and Taeyong are  _ always _ ahead of them. First to get a hybrid, first to bake cookies for the new neighbours, first to put up their Christmas decorations. 

It’s a shame they’re such nice people, Ten thinks, because he’d really quite enjoy hating them if it wasn’t absolutely impossible to do so. Since they’re basically the perfect neighbours, however, he genuinely loves them, even if he sometimes wishes  _ they’d _ forget trash collection day or get home drunk after a dinner party and wake up the curtain-twitchers across the street, so he’d feel less guilty about when he does it.

“We’ll be right out,” Taeyong calls. “We’ll just check on the cookies in the oven.”

Ten’s mouth waters despite the fact he ate breakfast two hours ago.

When they come back out to help and Kun and Ten both thank them, the couple just smile, as if this is absolutely nothing to them.

“We’re happy to help out,” Taeyong says, and he seems so genuine about it too. Kun comes up with a plan that involves two of them at each end of the tree, and as Ten struggles with the weight he notes that Taeyong and Doyoung are suspiciously strong for their size, hauling the heavy end of the tree with ease off the car and towards the house between them. 

“Vampires,” he mouths to Kun when their neighbours aren’t looking. “Or aliens.”

“What?” Kun mouths back, brow furrowed. Ten makes a mental note to bring this conversation up later, when their supernaturally beautiful, kind and helpful neighbours are back inside their own house.

It takes a little bit of maneuvering back and forth, and there is a near-miss where an unruly branch almost knocks down a row of photographs in the hallway, but between the four of them they manage to get the tree into place within twenty minutes. “Would you like to stay for a coffee?” Kun asks once they’re done. “Um, we might be out of milk and creamer, but I make a mean espresso?”

Ten adds, “We also have _ a lot  _ of holiday candy from the wholesalers.”

To their credit, Taeyong and Doyoung look quite torn, but Taeyong shakes his head. “I’m sorry, you caught us at a busy time” he says, looking sad. “My parents are visiting tomorrow and they notice every tiny speck of dust so we’re doing a deep clean, and then I have another batch of cookies to decorate.”

“We don’t even have milk in the house and you’re making multiple batches of cookies.” Ten can’t help but laugh at the gaping hole or disparity. “You must think we’re so…”

“Cool?” Taeyong suggests. 

Ten thinks he might have misheard. “What?”

“You seem such a cool couple. We— well, sometimes I see you taking the trash down to the edge of the street just five minutes before the collection comes and I just think,  _ wow _ it must be great to be so easygoing.” He blushes. “We’re so boring that we have a schedule on the fridge door for taking the trash out!”

“I think  _ we _ need to make a schedule,” Ten admits to Taeyong. “I think a schedule is cool.”

When their neighbours leave, Kun heads up to the attic to bring down the boxes of decorations that have been stored away for the last eleven months. Ten checks his emails, answers a few queries from his agent about his upcoming gallery shows and updates his Instagram with a photo of the bare tree.

Yuta, one of Ten’s old roommates, sends him a message almost as soon as he posts the photo.

_ Your tree is so big and thicc 👀 _

Ten wonders how long it’s been since his friend last got laid. He assumes it’s long enough for him to be getting  _ super _ desperate. He replies:

**_I don’t even know what to say to that yuta_ **

A few seconds later, Yuta replies: 

_ Sorry :( hope Kun enjoys decorating your big sexy tree  _

Ten laughs, but he can’t help but feel a bit ruffled by the fact that all of their friends naturally assume that it’s Kun who does everything for the holiday, even if they’re right. Or they  _ were _ right, but that was before this year.

The thing is that Ten just has never been as interested in making the house look festive for the holidays as Kun has, and then when they’d moved in together, Kun had seemed so knowledgeable and so excited about all of the small things that make a home extra cosy at Christmas that Ten had left him to take control of their festive makeovers and had kept his own creativity to his studio and his own artwork. 

After that, the tradition had sort of just stuck. Kun assumed that Ten didn’t have any interest in helping and he didn’t hold it against him, and then once they were married, someone had gifted them a tree decoration with their names on it, and Kun had asked Ten if he wanted to place it on the tree.

In retrospect, Ten regrets saying no to that off-hand question, because his refusal to join in had cemented his role - or lack thereof - in their holiday tradition and even three years later It makes him feel guilty and a little bit like he inadvertently locked himself out of a part of something so important to his husband, and Ten is determined to prove to him that he  _ does _ want to share the joys of the season.

Kun brings the last of the boxes of decorations into the living room and sets it down at the foot of the tree with a grunt. “I'll give you a massage later,” Ten tells him. It’s not meant to be an innuendo but Kun still grins at him and says, “Nice.”

Ten rolls his eyes and tries very hard to keep a straight face. “I didn’t say a blowjob, I said a massage.”

Kun leans down and presses a kiss to the top of Ten’s head. “Baby, your hands on my body are always sexy, even when I’ve pulled a muscle in my shoulder.” He laughs. 

Ten accepts the compliment with a kiss. “Do you want to open a giant bag of candy and go through the tree decorations together this afternoon?” He asks.

“Are you sure you have time?” Kun asks with kind eyes. It makes Ten’s heart lurch— he looks so uncertain, like Ten might be suggesting something totally unusual, which, technically he supposes he is. “You know you don’t have to help. It’s enough that you came to help get the tree.”

“This year is different,” Ten says, getting up from the sofa. “We’re going to do this together. But first I'm gonna bring  _ all _ the candy I can find in the pantry!”

“Not  _ all _ of it!” Kun calls to him as Ten leaves the room, but Ten pretends that he didn’t hear him.

They work in a quiet sort of harmony for about ten minutes, before Kun knocks over a stack of baubles, which roll under the tree and amongst the tiny fallen pines at the base. Kun curses and Ten tries not to laugh at him, and they both scramble under the tree, Kun telling Ten to be careful while he stretches like a cat all the way to the back of the tree to rescue the shiny decorations. 

They argue over whether a Christmas playlist is too much of a festive overload for a tree-decorating day; Ten thinks so, and he makes this clear, while Kun argues that listening to themed music adds a whole vibe that Ten mustn’t understand. Ten just rolls his eyes, but he can’t help but think that maybe he doesn't. Maybe he’s never understood and truthfully, maybe he never will, but he wants to try. If it’s something that means so much to Kun, it has to be worth it, he thinks, and he’s promised himself to make an effort this year— hence the big tree, the mountains of themed candy and his suggestion of making an afternoon of putting up decorations. 

“We can turn the Christmas playlist off after a while if you want,” Kun says, and it’s the little compromises like these that Ten knows is why their relationship works so well, despite the fact they don’t always see eye to eye. “Or switch to another playlist for a while. Just let me know.”

“I will.” Ten opens a cardboard box that is housing rows of silver hanging baubles for the tree. He sets about threading ribbon through the tops of them so that they can hang them from the branches of the tree. Kun works quietly alongside him, and Ten sneaks glances at him every few minutes.

He loves watching Kun like this— engrossed in something he enjoys. He kind of wishes he’d taken more notice of it at Christmas before, but at least he’s starting now. “Are we putting ribbons on the tree?”

“Hmm? Sure!” Kun gets up to find the box that holds the reels of red and silver ribbons.”Do you want to tie them into bows and decide where to put them on the tree or should I do it?”

Kun shrugs. “I’m easy,” he says. 

Ten is tempted to reply with something dirty, but he manages to resist temptation. “You can do it, if you want to. I don’t want to step on your toes.”

“Okay.” Kun sits down again and gets to work on the ribbons, leaving Ten to finish hanging the shiny baubles. He bursts into song every couple of songs, totally engrossed in his task, and even Ten finds himself humming along.

He’s so glad he decided to get involved in decorating the tree this year.

The tree is almost done when they stop to eat dinner— the bottom two thirds of the tree are fully decorated, and they just need to add some decorations and the tree-topper to the upper part. “I’ll bring the ladder down tomorrow morning so we can finish up,” Kun says, admiring the tree from the doorway of the room. “And then the room will be perfect!”

“Almost,” Ten says, thinking about the one box Kun didn’t bring down front the attic - a box of keepsakes that Ten had brought when they moved into the house. A box that includes a modest string of brightly coloured fairy lights. 

Kun looks at him quizzically but Ten just looks away. He wants this to be a surprise and he can’t risk giving anything away with his ridiculously in-love expressions. 

Ten sleeps well that night. He dreams of candy cane mountains and snow-frosted fir tree forests. The dream segues into the super long lines at the grocery store the day before Christmas, but Ten finds himself back in a snowy forest before he wakes up and Kun kisses his cheek and wraps him in a giant, marshmallow soft scarf before the dream ends. It’s nice.

When he wakes up, though, Kun’s side of the bed is empty. Ten checks his phone to find its past nine and that he has two messages from his agent and a friend request from Yukhei’s new boyfriend. There’s Christmas carols playing downstairs, and the smell of sweet vanilla drifting up the stairs. Kun must have made waffles, he thinks, stretching before he gets out of bed.

Ten grins as he plans their next hour in his head. Waffles, maybe some coffee, a shower (maybe together) and then finishing off the tree with their special fairy-lights and their new star tree topper. Perfect. 

But when Ten gets downstairs. Kun isn’t in the kitchen. He’s in the living room. He’s up a ladder in the living room, and the tree is finished, and there’s no room for extra fairy-lights. And the topper is there, on top of the tree, all of it completely done and without his help!

“Hey!” Kun smiles, as he climbs down the ladder. “What do you think?”

“It's finished.” Ten blinks. “You did it without me.”

Kun falters. This clearly isn’t the reaction he expected. "I thought I’d just get up early and finish it off so it looks good for your Instagram photos.” He frowns. “Wait, are you okay?”

Ten crosses his arms. "I wasn’t here so you just... Finished?"

Kun looks perturbed. "What's wrong with that?"

"What if— what if you went to check on the laundry during sex and I just finished myself off?" Ten asks. “You can’t just— just finish!”

"I didn't  _ jerk off  _ over the tree. I just finished decorating it. I didn't realise you cared that much.”

“You think I don’t  _ care _ ?” Ten opens his mouth to argue, but decides against it. He can’t tell whether he’s mad or disappointed, or just feeling guilty for how little interest in doing any of this he’s shown over the last 5 years. In the end he just sighs. “I'm going out back to my studio."

Ten sets up his tablet and pulls up his latest project. He doesn’t feel like sketching anything, and he doesn’t want to work on colouring the design when he’s angry (he’ll end up with too many reds and dark blues). It’s cold in his studio, which is a little annex at the back of the house. The heating isn’t turned on yet, and he’s still just in his pyjama shorts and an old T-shirt, so he just sits and scrolls absentmindedly through social media, stewing like the apple and cinnamon Kun cooked last week to make a pie. 

After five minutes, Kun knocks on the door and peeps his head in. "Peace offering?" He holds out a steaming mug of what smells like hot cocoa.

“Not thirsty.” Ten pretends to suddenly be interested in his work.

Kun makes a sad little noise that makes Ten feel  _ terrible _ . “Please take it. It has marshmallows,” he says. “So many marshmallows.”

Ten huffs out a breath. He does like marshmallows. He gets up and goes over to take the mug from Kun. He eats one of the half-melted, pink marshmallows off the top of the whipped cream. “I suppose it would be a shame to waste it,” he says, and then takes a proper sip. It’s delicious, of course. Kun does nothing by half, especially at this time of year.

It’s only then that Ten realises that Kun looks shifty, like he’s brought something else. Kun’s jacket is zipped up as high as it goes, as if he’s hiding something.

“Don’t even think about it,” Ten warns him, eyes narrowed. He licks at the cream on top of his drink. 

“About what?” Kun tries to look confused, but somehow it just makes him look extra handsome, damn him. 

“About taking out the sprig of mistletoe that I know you have hidden in your top.” Ten raises an eyebrow at him.

“Damn.” Kun frowns. “How did you know I had that?"

“I didn’t know for sure, but you’ve just confirmed it for me.” Ten smiles. God, Kun is so easy to read sometimes. That’s one of the reasons why Ten loves him, along with the infuriatingly handsome face and the fact he is dynamic and interesting, the kindest and most caring man that Ten has ever met. 

Kun unzips his jacket to reveal a sprig of mistletoe drawn on the back of a piece of paper, now crumpled. “I thought it might be romantic, that’s all.” He does, at least, have the decency to look a little bit sheepish. 

“It  _ might _ have been romantic,” Ten says. “If we were speaking. But we aren’t. I’ve come in here to be mad at you.”

Kun tilts his head to the side. “Remind me what I’ve done that’s so terrible?”

Ten stamps his foot, which he knows makes him look petulant and unreasonable, but whatever. “You finished decorating the top of the tree without me!”

"I didn't know… Oh, Ten, I just didn’t think that you'd mind. You never minded last year, or the year before. You’ve never been as into this as I have, so I figured you just wanted me to finish it." He reaches out and takes Ten’s arm, squeezing softly. “But, I was obviously wrong and I’m sorry.”

"You  _ were _ wrong. This year is different. This year I wanted to join in.” He knows it must sound stupid, but it was so important to Ten that he helped with  _ every _ part of the festivities this year. Now that he has slept through some of it, he feels like it’s a sign that he isn’t worthy of Kun’s favourite time of year. 

“Why?”

“Because you love it so much." Ten feels very small right now. “And because I love you, and I wanted to spend time with you making stupid Christmas memories.”

Kun looks at him. “Really?”

“Yeah.” Ten sniffs. “There was something I wanted to put on the tree, but you finished it and it’s missing now and— oh, it doesn’t matter.”

“It does. It matters to me.” Kun looks at him intently, giving Ten all of his attention. “Tell me, baby?”

Ten blushes. “The fairy lights, the ones you gave me when we first started dating. I wanted to put them on the tree this year.” 

“Oh Ten, I would  _ love _ to have them on the tree,” Kun tells him. “They’d be perfect.”

Ten hums. “But you already finished it, how can we add them?”

Kun just grins. “There’s always room for more decorations,” he explains. “That’s the one rule about Christmas trees— there are  _ no _ rules.”

Ten considers this. Says, “There’s one rule now, a new one, and it's don’t finish the tree without me.” 

“Deal. Kun laughs, taking Ten’s cup back in one hand and taking Ten’s hand in his other. He leads Ten out of the studio. “Come on, let’s go back into the house and get more hot chocolate, then we can add the lights to the tree.”

“Okay.” Ten lets Kun hold his hand properly. “After that I  _ might _ let you kiss me under the mistletoe properly.”

“Or under the fairy lights?” Kun suggests. “That could our new Christmas tradition— both of ours, together.”

“Yeah.” Ten smiles. “I’d like that,” he says.

Later, with the tree properly finished and the fairy lights twinkling above them, they start a new tradition, and vow to keep it up every year. 

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Bonus invitation card from their new BFFs/neighbours that was slipped through their door later that day : 
> 
> Dear neighbours, 
> 
> We would like to extend to you an invitation to our annual cheese and wine evening on the 27th. 
> 
> The event begins at 6.30pm and we will be serving a selection of fine cheeses and wines, as well as Taeyong’s famous iced gingerbread cookies. 
> 
> Please RSVP at your earliest convenience. 
> 
> Sincerely, 
> 
> Taeyong & Doyoung (your neighbours at number 5)


End file.
